Deregulation of the phone industry and the consequent proliferation of service providers offering a vast array of service or rate plans may have led to intense competition in providing phone services. While creating more choices for the consumer, the large number of plans available, with their unique rate structures, may make it more difficult, and at times nearly impossible, for the consumer to determine which plan would best serve his or her needs. Additionally, bundling of services, such as long distance, local calling, cellular, cable and internet access services, may make the choice of service provider and the service plan offered by the provider that much more confusing for the consumer.
To aid consumers in making such choices, consumers may contact a service provider to obtain service plan information, such as rate structures, and may typically obtain comparisons of a service provider's plans with the consumer's current plan. However, the costs of the various plans may be sensitive to the total usage and the pattern of usage that the consumer may exhibit. Without such usage information, a consumer may not be able to determine how much the individual plans may costs. Also, contacting the many different providers may be time consuming and the consumer may not know which rate plan to seek information about or which plans can be realistically compared based on the consumer's needs.
Additionally, some service providers, vendors and consumer assistance groups may provide interactive web sites, or tools, that assist the consumer in choosing or comparing rate plans. Since such tools may not use actual historical billing data or usage patterns, the consumer may input usage information, typically by responding to questions from the tool, and the tool may return a recommended plan showing the rates or costs of the plan based on the input usage information. The tools may also show alternative plans and may list a comparison of plans. However, these tools may generally offer comparisons for a single service, such as long distance or cellular service, and may provide comparisons with a limited number of plans.
Since the usage information that the consumer may have input may be based on the consumer's estimates of usage and not on real-time, or actual usage information, it may be difficult to convince the consumer that the comparisons are valid. Also, if the consumer wishes to order one of the plans, the sites may not provide the links required for the consumer to place the order, or, if a link may be provided, consumer or plan information may not be carried from one site to the other.